Via BBC news

Results of a review study conducted by Elizabeth Murray and co-workers from University College London suggest that the use of interactive websites can help people with chronic illnesses such as depression, heart disease and HIV/Aids.

The review was based on a total of 24 studies involving 3,739 participants who all had chronic (long-term) health conditions. UCL researchers looked at these patients' use of interactive computer websites and programmes, which contained information services plus online support groups, chatrooms, or tailored advice based on a person's details, affected people with such chronic diseases.

The authors of the research found that interactive sites were of greater benefit to people than those with information alone, or not using sites at all. Moreover, researchers found that such sites made patients feel better informed, more socially supported, and helped them to improve self-efficacy - a person's belief in their ability to carry out potentially-beneficial actions.

yesterday while I was visiting we-make-money-not-art I saw the picture of this strange-wearing guy

that face looked familiar to me but I could not recognize him. Then automatically popped into my head the name of my ex-colleague at Fraunhofer VR-Lab, Dragan Espenschied.

To my great surprise, I discovered that Dragan has become a world-famous electronic music artist as well as a respected media artist. These pictures are part of one of his last works, Frozen Niki

Frozen Niki is a story of this cosmonaut, organized in the form of a blog without text and has to be read from bottom up to follow his fragmentary thoughts and a detective love story:

“… and now a few words about one of the most important members of the intergalactic expedition, Nikolaj Osinin. He will not be able to participate in the everyday life of the mission. He has his own mission: to remain young and fit until the spaceship Zvezdostella reaches the Magellanic Clouds, to perform his tasks upon arrival then pilot the ship back to the Milky Way and finally to Earth. He’ll spend the next 20 years in a cryogenic box. But he will be with us. His brain activity will be monitored by the Central Mission Computer. In due course Nikolaj’s cranium will be stablized at the -20°C mark and data transmission to the Bajkanur server will be initiated and fed immediately via the Internet to Nikolaj’s personal blog.”

compliments Dragan!!

via wired

The Vibrato, a prototype developed by design graduate Shane Kerwin from Brunel University, converts music into vibrations that allow the deaf to listen to and create music via a PC.

"I hope that Vibrato will help us to integrate deaf students into mainstream musical education and enable schools to encourage deaf children to take up music as much as hearing children" said Kervin (source: BBC news)